Science, because I want to

My elementary school did not have a science lab or even  a science teacher, so when I reached high school, I was unfamiliar with the workings of bunsen burners and didn't know the difference between a beaker, a test tube and a flask. In grade 9, I was in a class with kids who had to repeat it, so they always gathered the equipment and set it up while I read the experiment and wrote it up.

In grade 10, when I asked my physical science teacher what I needed, he accused me of being difficult, and from that point on, refused to answer any questions I or my lab partner had. We were the "giggling girls" (which only got worse over time), and he was never interested in seeing us as curious, intelligent students. The curriculum didn't help. Levers and pulleys could have been much more interesting--just ask my kids! Why were we only beginning to study that in grade 10? He gave us more academic credit for washing the glassware (doing the dishes) than for actually doing any science.


But I was always very curious, and would not let the stereotyped opinions of this so-called teacher ruin that. Ever since then I have made a point of learning what I could, on my own, about physics, albeit from a layperson's perspective. For me it is pure entertainment. I gain pleasure in learning what I can and passing it on enthusiastically to others. It is in this spirit that I have introduced my kids to kitchen chemistry, Rube Goldberg machines, model rocketry, and amateur astronomy. My kids have enjoyed exploring fractal patterns, discussing mind experiments about black holes and dark matter over dinner, and wondering about the nature of potential extra dimensions as postulated by string theory. And why shouldn't they? These are the topics that tickle the imagination and make you come back again asking for more.


These are the interesting things--the "what ifs", the wonders of things yet to be discovered as well as the exclamations of delight upon mixing glue and borax to get a strange polymer, the fascination of making cabbage water turn every colour in the rainbow, and figuring out what makes that happen. If the kids can know that awe and wonder about the world, and maintain it throughout their lives, I believe I will have attained something Mr. Penton never could. Maybe, in that sense, Mr. Penton did my family a favour.

In this spirit, I have shared some of our science experiments and resources we have enjoyed on Lemonade: http://www.greensim.com/lemonade/science.html